Not So Formal Introductions
by Rose's.wings
Summary: First impressions are always important, doubly so when you're meeting robotic aliens that have just done you the great service of saving your life. But it seems that Aria is just unable to keep from causing mischief. Besides, Wheeljack started it.


XD My first finished TF oneshot! Hooray! Now if only I can finish my rough draft of my philosophy paper before tomorrow at 1 and everything will go along swimmingly.

So, this ties into my longer story, _I Lost A World! _(and if you haven't read it you should; Mrs. Mittens commands it! *^-^ No I didn't*), and it goes in that first page break of chapter 7: The Interpreter. And as you probably already know, it's how Aria was introduced to Wheeljack, Ratchet, and Jazz. And yeah, it goes about as well as you probably imagined it would. ;p But if you haven't read it that's fine too. It's a pretty simple concept - human sent to Cybertron meets our favorite robots but can't understand them. Needless to say, this makes learning names just a _tad_ difficult, or at least, kinda funny...

Inspired by a review left by Destinyswindow, whom I thank with amazing muchness! Hope it makes you laugh and that all of you love this story! And no, I have no idea who Vincent D'Onofrio is...

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Not So Formal Introductions

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"It's pretty simple, pretty obvious: that people's first impressions of people are really a big mistake." - **Vincent D'Onofrio**

~^..^~

Aria might not understand many things about the aliens she had so recently found herself with, but she was quickly learning that baby talk was universal.

"Come on you funny little organic softie, say Wheeljack. _Wheeljack_." One of the new robots was talking to her in his unintelligible, galactic babble, pointing at his green painted chest.

Alright, so that might be a total mistranslation, but Aria's keen woman's intuition told her that it wasn't.

It turned out that her intuition was eerily accurate.

"I don't think that it's working Wheeljack," Jazz said from where he stood causally on the other side of the table to Wheeljack's right, arms crossed over her matte silver chest as he watched his inventor friend try and communicate his name to the little organic standing on the table between the four of them.

Wheeljack flashed a look at the other mech but otherwise didn't turn away from Ariah looking up at him from his workshop table. "What are you talking about? Of course it's working. Look at how attentive she is."

It did appear to be true. Ariah was standing still on the table top, staring up at Wheeljack with furrowed optic ridges. But what the mechs didn't realize was that it was not thoughtfulness that made her organic faceplates shift.

From where she stood, arms crossed somewhat angrily over her chest, Aria frowned slightly up at the most outgoing of the robots. _"__He __wasn__'__t__" _she thought to herself, _"__no, __but __then, __he __isn__'__t _really _talking __to __me __like __I__'__m __some __sort __of _baby _is __he?__"_

Aria shook her head. "Nah," she muttered under her breath, "it's not quite cutesy enough. But then again..." she let the unfinished thought hang in her head as well as her mouth as she thought it over. They wanted to talk to her like she was some ignorant, doe eyed, child? Fine. She'd give them Bambi eyes _and_childishness.

So she uncrossed her arms and pointed up at Wheeljack and said with a two year old's grin, "Mister Green!" Whether she meant to or not, her voice pitched upward slightly in a silly, childish manner.

Aria held in her laughter as Wheeljack jerked back a little, glowing blue eyes blinking down at her in a very confused look.

"What?" He all but shouted in his surprise.

Jazz didn't bother hiding his amusement. "Told you it wasn't working," He snickered.

Wheeljack blinked at him, his face falling slightly in disappointment. "But I thought it was going so well," he murmured gloomily.

"Well apparently not as well as you thought." Ratchet spoke up from where he stood on the last side of the table between Wheeljack and the data clerk Orion Pax who had first brought the strange little organic in when she had fallen ill to an inner malfunction. "You're making it too complicated for her. She's probably not even a tenth of our size. Her processors are physically much smaller then ours. It's possible she just doesn't have the capacity to understand all of what you're saying. Here, let me try."

Orion Pax slanted the mechasurgeon a look at the other's somewhat patronizing tone. He quietly reminded himself that the emergency yellow mech had only seen Ariah unconscious so far. He didn't know any better.

On the flip side he also had no idea what he was getting himself into either, but Orion Pax decided to stay quiet and let the others figure this out the hard way instead.

Ratchet leaned down to be closer to optic level with Wheeljack's guest and once he was sure that he had her attention (and it would have been difficult for her _not_to see him since his eyes were bright enough to throw her shadow ten feet out behind her) he gestured to his chest and said very slowly, "Ra-chet."

Aria grinned wider. There were so many more words that rhymed with Ratchet than Wheeljack.

For instance...

"Hatchet!"

Ratchet's reaction was so much more spectacular then Wheeljack's had been. He jerked back in complete surprise, mouth dropping open and eyes dimming slightly before blazing even brighter than before.

"What?" He demanded loud enough that Aria almost fell over from the sound. For that first instant she wasn't sure if she should feel more amused or slightly frightened. He sounded downright ticked.

"What-where-" Ratchet sputtered as he stared at the little femme, then briefly up at Orion Pax, before settling his irate glare on Jazz across from him. "Where in the Pit did she hear that?" He shouted.

"Well don't look at me." Jazz said defensively, "I didn't tell her. This is the first time I've seen her awake." He told them, hoping to avoid this argument, again.

It looked like he was going to have as much luck avoiding it as he had the first seven times. "Yeah, well maybe she didn't hear it from you directly. The other orbit I was showing around the newest additions to the center and one of them asked me if I was the infamous Hatchet!" He said, sorely unhappy about the whole thing.

Jazz held his hands out and took a careful step backwards, keeping an optic out for anything flying towards his head. But before he could say anything else, a not-so-hidden snicker came from his left.

Ratchet looked over, still glowering, at Wheeljack, who was having a hard time trying to stop his laughter even with Ratchet giving him the evil eye.

Jazz was just glad that he was no longer the center of Ratchet's furious attention.

"It's not funny Wheeljack." Ratchet growled.

In what was either bravery or stupidity – Orion Pax wasn't sure which – Wheeljack looked up at his long time friend without even a nervous twitch. "Oh come on Ratchet, it's kind of funny. I mean," he quickly continued before Ratchet could do something he might regret later, "even _she_, the _alien_, has heard about you. Tell me you aren't even the _tiniest_ bit flattered." Wheeljack said, holding two of his thick fingers a small distance apart to illustrate his words.

Ratchet gave him a flat look. "No."

There was a moment of tense silence where no one dared to say anything else. Seeing his opportunity to guide the conversation away from Ratchet's impending explosion, Orion Pax took it.

"Ariah," he said, grabbing the young girl's attention. He noted the mischievous grin on her face, but decided not to act on it quite yet since so far nothing _too_ drastic had happened. When she had turned to face him, he pointed over at the only mech she hadn't yet been introduced too. "This is Jazz. A good friend of mine."

True confusion appeared on Ariah's face for the first time. The four mechs fell silent as they waited to see if the little organic had finally figured out what was going on.

Of course she already had, so that wasn't the reason for her confusion, but they didn't know that.

"What like the music?" She asked, not expecting an answer as she stared up at the smallest of the robots.

They stared down at her, the only movement was Jazz shifting his weight to one foot and propping his hands on his hips as he stared down at the organic staring up at him.

Aria couldn't resist the need to try and explain. "You know, jazz music, like, um, well like this," and then she crooked her hands out in front of her like she was holding an invisible saxophone and made an off beat trill, like a sick goose, with her mouth.

Jazz just cocked his head at her. "What the heck was that?" He asked Orion Pax.

"Beats me." The largest mech answered with a shrug. "She acts like that sometimes, but I can't figure out why or what it means."

Wheeljack just went back to his earlier approach. "No, little softie. No thphtt," he tried to imitate Aria's saxophone noise with little success. "Say. Wheeljack."

"Alrighty Jackie!" Aria said with a smile.

"Well," Jazz said as he re-crossed his arms and looked down at her again, "she's getting closer."

Ratchet gave a short laugh. "Yeah, much closer _Jackie_." He mocked.

Wheeljack stared at him a moment. "Alright," he said as he leaned down and rested his chin on the table directly in front of Aria, "let's try something else. Say _Hatchet_ Aria." He told her simply.

Aria beamed, more then pleased to oblige. "Hatchet!" She said.

Ratchet managed to make a strangled noise before reaching over and smacking Wheeljack upside the head. "Don't teach her that!" He yelled.

"Go figure," Jazz murmured to Orion Pax as Ratchet continued to rave against that 'horribly undeserved name' and Wheeljack continued to laugh relentlessly at him, even as the mechasurgeon threw a misaimed piece of debris from the inventor's earlier explosion, "that's the only name she's gotten right."

Aria chose that moment to repeat her poor imitation of a saxophone.

"Hey now don't drag me into this!" Jazz told her, trying not to attract the attention of the increasingly agitated Ratchet.

Lucky for Jazz, he was too busy yelling at the greatly amused Wheeljack to hear. "Would you mute it Wheeljack?" The yellow mech shouted, half-throwing another piece of scrap that caught a glancing blow off of Wheeljack's shoulder. He was still fuming of course, but now he was at least giving Wheeljack a chance to back off before he well and truly lost it.

"Oh relax Ratch, it's just a name. No one takes it seriously." Wheeljack said, clearly believing it.

Ratchet, however, did not. "Yeah?" He sniped. "Tell that to the new intern. He seems to think I'm too dangerous to leave a patient _alone_ with." He growled in equal parts frustrated and upset.

Wheeljack just shrugged. "Ignore him. He's just a newbie. Doesn't know a thing yet. That's why he's here. And besides," he pressed on, either unaware of his immediate danger, or possibly just blatantly ignoring it, "you _do_have the bedside manner of a rampaging Titanium Moosebot so-"

_CLANG!_

Jazz just shook his head as one of Wheeljack's own tools collided with the side of his head, sending him sideways. The inventor lay there, stunned, as he stared up at the ceiling. Ratchet just looked up and glared at the others.

"Anyone else got something to say about my bedside manner?" He demanded irritably.

Orion saw that even Ariah shook her head 'no'.

Of course Wheeljack only started laughing, albeit weaker now than before.

"Great," Jazz said as he and Orion Pax leaned over the table to get a good look at the sniggering Wheeljack lying on the floor. "I think you fried him Ratchet."

Ratchet looked horrified. "I did not." He protested.

Jazz pointed down at Wheeljack, who was rocking now from side to side to boot. "Well what else do you call it?" He demanded. "Ratchet therapy?"

"Now listen here you loud mouthed brat I-" Ratchet started, pointing a powerful finger at the younger mech. Jazz of course started to argue back with all the cheek he was known for. Wheeljack didn't try to stop them, just sat up and got his laughter under control as he found his feet again.

Orion Pax looked around at the growing chaos he was suddenly stuck in and vented a sigh. Instead of trying to calm the other two down – a hopeless venture he felt – he went straight to the source of the problem.

"Ariah," he muttered as he gently nudged the laughing organic standing on the table, "quit causing trouble and at least _try_ and behave yourself." He told her seriously.

Aria stumbled from his gentle shove, laughing so hard now that tears were starting to stream down her face. But instead of calming down, she kept on laughing.

Eventually Ratchet, Jazz, and Wheeljack stopped their respective shouting and snickering when the little organic finally fell over, hands holding her sides as if she thought they were about to just split open.

"Is she about to offline herself?" Jazz asked conversationally.

"What?" Ratchet shouted anxiously, "she can do that?" Then before they could try to answer him, he leaned down and quickly scanned the convulsing Aria.

"S-stop!" She finally managed to get enough air to speak with. "Stahahaop, you're-you're t-too much." She said through her nearly hysterical laughter. Then she collapsed against the tabletop again and laughed herself silly.

Orion Pax just rolled his eyes, although he was trying hard not to grin at the whole scene. "Ariah," Orion Pax said as he nudged her again.

Aria waved him away along with the last of her giggles, finally remembering how to breathe again. "Alright, alright," she gasped, as she got a hold of herself, "Ratchet, Wheeljack, and Jazz, I got it." She said, pointing to each one in turn from where she now sat on the table.

The mechs stared at her for a moment.

"We've been had!" Ratchet finally realized.

"Huh," Jazz said, clearly floored.

Wheeljack just nodded.

Ratchet was having trouble wrapping his mind around this new revelation on organic life. "But-what-how?" He asked, open mouthed, as he turned to stare at Orion Pax.

"She is completely self-aware." Orion Pax told him in what might have been a soft rebuke for the older mech's earlier comment on Ariah's capacity to understand, but might also have just been a plain statement coming from the data clerk. But whether Ratchet took it as a reproach or not Orion didn't see. He turned an optic in mild reproof on Ariah instead. "She is also exceedingly tricky at times."

Aria just smiled sweetly up at them as she rocked backwards on the table, her arms wrapped around one up drawn knee. She giggled cutely.

Orion Pax shook his head at her, but she caught the grin itching to come out of the corners of his mouth. She stood up when he reached a hand out for her to climb onto.

"If she is out of danger then perhaps it is best we leave now," Orion Pax said calmly as he straightened up, Aria sitting in his hand. She was stubbornly looking at everything but the floor as her legs dangled over the edge of his palm. "Are you coming Jazz, or are you planning to stay longer?" Orion Pax asked in what might have been the most normal tone in the world.

Jazz just shook his head.

"Alright, I'll see you later then. Thank you both, Wheeljack and Ratchet, for your help. It was most appreciated." He thanked them formally, bowing slightly as he did.

"No problem," Wheeljack muttered.

"Come by any time," Ratchet heard himself say.

Aria just waved at them from the door, smiling as innocently as any secretly rambunctious child they had ever seen.

Then the door closed behind the two and the three dazed mechs were left to themselves. They stared at the closed door for some time before Ratchet managed to speak, although his voice was clearly still stunned.

"Devious." The oldest mech breathed.

Wheeljack and Jazz just nodded, struck dumb by the fact that a little organic creature – no bigger then any of their thumbs – had just played them all like a string quartet.

Jazz gave himself a little shake to come back to his usual self. "I sure wouldn't want to run across a planet filled with a bunch of things like her."

"But just think," Wheeljack spoke up, "there really _is_ a planet like that. Just full of creatures like Aria."

There was a moment of dead silence.

"Yikes."

"Scary."

"Primus save us all if they ever learn space travel." Ratchet breathed by way of fervent prayer.

Wheeljack and Jazz nodded again, more eagerly than before.


End file.
